The Sun Shines in Edmonton: Where Were You 35 Years Ago?

I was in my second grade and was supposed to attend school that day but the then president, Ferdinand E. Marcos, suspended school. I remember my classroom. It was an annex of sort, separated from all the other classrooms which is in the main street of Aniban, Bacoor, Cavite. We were inside a "silong" of the house owned by the principal. Our teacher was his wife...

In the weeks leading up to and right on the day of the fight, there were tremendous amount of talks all over my neighborhood. I didn't know anything about boxing at the time so I didn't care. I was just happy that there was no school and planned on playing my favorite game. But I knew there was a big event and they called it Thrilla in Manila.

The fight was held in Araneta Coliseum, not too far from where we lived, but it didn't matter. We were so poor we could not afford to buy a ticket to watch it live. We did not even have a TV set. A neighbour, had bought a new "black and white" set. They were the first and maybe the only house in the neighbourhood that had TV at the time.

And so, I remember a lot of people were in the neighbour's house including myself. I had nobody to play with. Everybody was watching so I went with the flow. I remember somebody asked me, "Who are you rooting for?" I said, "Frazier!" just because most were saying Ali would win.

The fight ended when Joe's trainer won the argument to give up and end the fight but a documentary of the event showed Frazier vehemently opposed to it. Had Joe been allowed, he would have won as Ali admitted in the post fight interview that he might not have been able to last another round. He was evidently so tired at the end that he collapsed in the middle of the ring even before any announcement was made.

Watch this documentary.